Mark Chisnell, Spanish Castle to White Night ***

This book tells the story of the eight boats that sailed the 2008-2009 Volvo Ocean Race. The writing style is exactly the style of articles in sailing magazines, which I found kind of annoying. On the other hand, Chisnell covers many interesting aspects of ocean racing over the course of many chapters: strategic planning, weather forecasting, food preparation, disaster recovery, race coordination, and so on — although with comparatively little in the way of actual sailing maneuvers. Interesting but not entirely compelling as a narrative.

Note that I read this book on my Kindle, where it didn't have any pictures. Pictures would have been good.

G.K. Chesterton, The Man Who Was Thursday ** 1/2

An intriguing introduction to this book appeared in The Ecstacy of Influence, and barely a week later I came across a copy in an airport book store. Kismet!

Alas, I didn't care for it. The Man Who Was Thursday is an allegorical spy story, for lack of a better description. An undercover police officer infiltrates the Central Anarchist Council, only to discover that most of the other ranking anarchists are policemen also. The initial chapters are strong, especially the chapter describing the background of our hero Gabriel Syme, but I lost interest as the book left realism behind for a farcical tone.

John Henry Patterson, The Man-Eaters of Tsavo ***

I followed up my first Kindle book with what appears to be my first print-on-demand book.

The Man-Eaters of Tsavo is a non-fiction adventure story written in 1907. The title refers to a pair of lions that terrorized a railway construction crew in East Africa until the author managed to hunt them down. Patterson was a railway engineer, and the book covers that discipline a little while focusing on his hunting exploits. Patterson is a good writer in the Victorian style, which means sentences like this one, which comes after his borrowed gun misfires:

Bitterly did I anathematise the hour in which I had relied on a borrowed weapon, and in my disappointment and vexation I abused owner, maker, and rifle with fine impartiality. (p 31)

The first third of the book, which describes the man-eater's reign of terror, is a taut, exciting story. The remainder, which covers the rest of his time in Africa, is interesting but less involving. I'd give the first third a four star rating.

I read the book in an edition that was remarkably free of any of the usual paraphernalia. No copyright page, no author bio, no introduction to provide context. The front cover has just the author name and title over a color picture that is unrelated to the contents. The back cover says, "This collection serves as a vessel to carry forth the light shed by the greatest writers the world has ever known," without any indication of what collection we're talking about. Finally, I noticed this on the bottom of the final page:

Made in the USA
Lexington, KY
17 December 2011

It felt appropriate to read this story from another world in an edition that preserved an element of mystery about its provenance.

One last note about this story. As it happens, back in 1974 at the age of 11, I read the Reader's Digest Condensed Book version of an obscure novel titled Lion in the Evening. It was the story of a railroad crew being attacked by a pair of man-eating lions. The surrounding plot didn't thrill me, but I've always remembered the mood that descended on the men as evening fell. (I also learned the word "escarpment" from this book.) Now I've read the true story on which that book was based. Coincidence, eh?

Steven Millhauser, We Others ****

The first book I read on my Kindle!

We Others is a collection of new and reprinted stories. Millhauser has a very distinctive writing style that combines old-fashioned prose with contemporary flourishes. Like his novel Martin Dressler, his stories tend to take place in the past — he is especially enamored of the late nineteenth century — and to move from a detailed realism at the beginning to over-the-top fantasy by the end. (Would a story like "August Eschenburg" be considered steampunk?) It's a joy to read an author interested in the pleasures of narrative.

I enjoyed most of the stories in the collection. My least favorite was the one that strayed farthest from Millhauser's typical concerns: the early story "A Protest Against the Sun," which seemed like faux J.D. Salinger. My favorites included most of the new stories (although not the over-long title story), "August Eschenburg," and "The Barnum Museum."

A major theme of the story "August Eschenburg" was the purpose of art and motivations of artists. One character asserts that "the proper end of a work of art was to arouse in the beholder a state of quiet reflection and not of astonishment." Despite the fantastic flights to which Millhauser's stories often lead, they do arouse in me a state of quiet reflection.